Irony
by Quiet Redemption
Summary: It was so tempting, to stay there forever. To stay in the Speed Force. He probably would have stayed and ignored the hand reaching out to him, had it not been for the other soul with him that gave him the push. "It's almost funny...The only difference is that you went to fast, while I went to slow." Divided We Fall. Post-Endgame. Wally/Flash centric. Reviews are nice.


Flash surveyed the world around him. The swirls of color interspersed with bursts of light. There was no word to describe what He felt right now. Nothing so simple as a word could hope to explain the rightness that existed inside of him. Before, everything was to…slow. It had been for as long as he could remember. So long ago that he had just gotten used to the slowness. The feeling of crawling through time no, even crawling was too fast. Now he felt normal. This world, this _Force_ was beautiful. It was home.

'_But still,'_ Flash looked back at the rift behind him. That mar in this world of perfection. IT had been there for half an hour now. The hand sticking out of the rift. It just sat there as if waiting for something, or someone to take it. _'Me. It's waiting for me.'_ But he didn't want to leave. Not yet anyways, maybe not ever. He knew that there was something on the other side waiting for him, wherever that hand had come from. But he didn't want to leave here. Everything from _before_ was a blurry, hazy fog. Not clear enough to risk that feeling of wrongness, of the slowness that he remembered from before. Not nearly enough to leave here.

"You're not going to take it?" asked a voice, so very familiar and yet not. Flash whirled around with his eyes wide behind his mask. He looked around, but there was no one to be seen.

"Whose there?" he asked. It was an honest question. It seemed like he had been here for weeks, but never once had he seen the signs of the presence of another being. Not until the hand had appeared anyways.

"Doesn't matter," the voice told him, still so achingly familiar. "What matters is why you haven't grabbed onto that hand yet." The voice spoke at him like he was a complete idiot for waiting so long.

"Why should I?" he questioned. "It's wonderful here. Amazing. Why should I go back there?"

"What about your friends? Your family? The people that stand on the other side of that rift who are waiting for you to come home." As the voice spoke to him, Flash turned back to the portal and saw that the tip of a wing had appeared alongside the hand. Its appearance and the words of the voice helped images penetrate through the fog that coated his memories of _before_. The image of a red haired woman with large, majestic wings appeared. _'Shayera? That's who she is, right?' _

Memories of the other place continued to form. Memories of battles and enemies danced across his mind, but along with them came dreams of a friendship_ (No, we were something more than that)_ that had withstood everything that had tried to destroy them. _(To destroy everything)_ Something was still missing though. Something that made him want to stay within the Speed Force _(NO! Go back -, take her hand and go back!) _

Another voice had appeared, but this one was inside of him. _'Pretty sure that's a bad thing,'_ he thought to himself. The voice inside grew stronger as the memories of that place did. _'Still though'_, Flash decided staring at the hand and wing, _'whoever that is I should let them know that I'm happy here. So they don't worry.' _ "Shayera? It's so beautiful here. There's a Force. A Speed Force. It's calling me home. I have to go now.*" _'There, that should help,' _he thought._ (It won't)_

"That's not going to work," and there was that voice again. It spoke, unknowingly repeating the words of the other one inside of him. Beyond the voice, the Speed Force continued to swirl and dance and sing with beauty and power. Flash turned back to where he thought the voice was coming from.

"Seriously, who are you? And why do you care so much whether I go back there." He called out to it.

Somehow he felt like the voice was smirking as it continued to talk as if he had never spoken. "If their anything like my team, everything you told them is just going to make them try harder to reach you." Soon though, the voice seemed to take on a desperate tone. "You need to remember -. You need to remember them now before it's too late and you're here forever. You will never forgive yourself if you don't"

"What are you calling me?" he asked, "and answer my question! Why do you care so much?"

"You haven't figured it out yet -?" It questioned back. There was something indistinguishable at the end of the question, a word that he should know. Something important. _(It's our name dude) 'Our name. That's what I need to know, to decide.' _

Suddenly, more flashes of memories invaded his mind, except these were different. Instinct told him that they weren't his. They belonged to the voice. Images played of another team so similar, and yet so different from his own. That same deeper friendship, that word he still couldn't find._ (Family)_ Running to meet them every day after school. Playing pranks and eating slightly burnt cookies. Cuddling on the couch and doing homework. Fighting side by side, knowing that they would give just as much to see you home as you would for them.

Then, memories that were his own appeared. Memories that matched with those of the voice. Heading straight for the base _(The Watchtower)_ after work. Stealing cookies from the green man _(J'onn)_ and planning pranks both with and on the man with the ring _(John)._ Falling asleep during Monitor Duty and waking up on the couch with a black-haired woman shaking her head with the winged woman beside her _(Diana and Shayera)._ Going into battle, knowing he could goof around a bit because they would all have his back. Suddenly the name came back to him. The name that had been evading him. The name that belonged to him, to the voice in side of him, and to the being with him in the Force. _Wally_.

He turned around and saw himself, only younger and different from what he remembered of being Kid Flash. Green eyes instead of blue. A uniform with more armor, rather than pure spandex. A set of goggles sat on his head, and a circle surrounding the lightning bolt on his chest. Still, despite the changes, Wally knew that he was staring at himself.

Kid Flash began to speak again "There you are," he said with a grin. "Was wondering when you'd get back."

"How…Why…" Wally couldn't find the words to say. Questions raced across his mind. How was there another Wally West inside of the Speed Force? Was this the Wally of the Justice Lords, or was he from somewhere else? Why on earth was he helping him?

"It's almost funny," His other-self began in a light tone, ignoring the unspoken questions. "We both saved the world, we both ended up here, we both faded into the Force. The only difference is that you went to fast, while I went to slow." He laughed to himself before continuing, his eyes and voice now solemn. "That hand isn't going to be there forever Wally, and even if it were the Speed Force is going to call you back if you wait too long." Other Wally was still looking at him, but his eyes were distant, and Flash knew that his counterpart was looking past the Speed Force to his own world. To that other team that was so similar to his own. To the family he had left behind when he had joined the Speed Force. To the place he could never go back to again.

"Go," and with that final word to his counterpart, Kid Flash turned around and walked back into the Speed Force.

"Thankyou," the word came out as a whisper, Wally was almost afraid his other hadn't heard it. But then, Wally saw his younger self turn back and smile before nodding in acknowledgement of his words. Then Wally turned back around to the rift and without any more hesitation grabbed Shayera's hand.

END

* Line taken directly from JLU episode: Divided We Fall.

**END NOTES:** To those who are confused, the voice in the parenthesis is the subconscious of Wally of JLU. He had the memories and as they grew stronger so did he. Flash was the connection to the Speed Force and without the memories of Wally, thus why he felt so at home there. YJ Wally was needed to merge the two of them back together and give Wally/Flash the push needed to go home.

It killed me to write this. It really did. I want so badly for YJ to continue and for Wally to be found. Unfortunately CN is mean and the series is over and baring any drastic changes it will stay that way. However, despite how much this hurt to write, after I watch the finale (about 5 hours ago) and saw Wally…die *sob* I had to write this.

I've had a plotline like this in my head for a while now, even before the finale for YJ came out. I may even write it someday…maybe. In the original idea, Zatanna just became Dr. Fate and the league is trying to convince Nabu to let her go. Fate make a golden dome and pushes everyone away but Wally and him(her?). Fate says there is an imbalance in the worlds that only Wally can fix. On Earth-12 (the DCAU world), Barry has died before having children, Jay is too old to have kids, and Wally was killed by abusive parents. In otherwords, No Speedsters.

This means that there is a 100% chance that the League of that world will lose the fight for Earth. This is bad for Fate, because he's all about the balance. There has to be an even chance of win or loss. Long monologue cut short, if Wally agrees to go to this world AND not try to find a way back to Earth-16 (thus defeating the purpose of sending him there) then Fate will let Zatanna go. Fate also tells him that there will be a point where Wally will able to come back to Earth-16 without Earth-12 falling.

Wally agrees on the condition that, should his team find HIM, he is allowed to go back with them. Time skip to a few years after JLU series Finale (probably around…8-12 years spent on that Earth total) and Robin and Aqualad have appeared on Earth-12 looking for Kid Flash. For them it has only been a few months, a year at most. Now Wally has a choice. Leave or Stay.

So yeah, that's been in my head since S1 Finale when I realized that the Rimbor 6 = the Justice Lords. When I saw the S2 Finale for YJ, that turned into the above fic. This is probably going to be a one shot, but let me know if you think I should try out the original idea or not. I have the basic idea of what I want to happen, I just don't know how to get there.

Cyber cookies to anyone who actually read all of that.

Quiet Redemption


End file.
